Hi to all keen gardeners,
you know the thing I really love about gardening? There are no age restrictions or limits for jumping into the garden and burying yourself up to the elbows in soil, or busying yourself planting, or weeding, or doing anything that gives you 'green thumbs'. And though a lot of us come to love the garden and its many beautiful bounties as our years advance, I find that Lucy and Erin are enthusiastic, excitable and energetic gardeners even though they are kids.
But enough about the age-less beauty of gardening. While the hot weather continues to glare down on us remember to keep mulching and doing everything you can to help the garden retain that precious water. And with this warm stretch you also need to watch out for disease, especially (the dreaded) Blackspot.
Now my Mum swears (it was so tempting to end this sentence right here) by a mixture of Milk and water (60/40 mix of water and milk) sprayed on leaves to sort out many a plant disease. While I love and respect Mum's great advice, I also use Synthetic Pyrethrum - which works really well on a number of plant diseases. Mineral Oil is also really effective, and is OK for 'organic gardeners'. I have also added Kiwicare, organic super spraying oil into my preventative spray schedule.
Anyway, I am off to change a young mans (gardeners) Nappy. Incidentally we are about to start using a German brand of disposables that are supposedly fully biodegradable - they are called MOLTEX, Nature Number One. And I will be shredding the ones with pee and seeing how they go in my compost bin (of course it goes without saying they'll be a good layer of Bokashi Boost to help them along). Will keep you posted on the results. Until then, happy gardening and enjoy this great weather.
Dougal
Bokashi Boost Boffin & Green Thumbed Guru (tho mum might argue that title)